


Films about ghosts

by dancinguniverse



Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Post-War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-14
Updated: 2015-04-14
Packaged: 2018-03-22 19:47:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3741382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dancinguniverse/pseuds/dancinguniverse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dick realizes the roaring isn't all in his head, that he's heaving in hard, whistling breaths through his nose, his jaw locked and set. He never did break in Bostogne, was too cold, too annoyed, too far back from the line, but he saw the same horrors as every other man who was there and they come back on him now, a year later and an ocean away, with a vengeance.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Films about ghosts

Dick jerks awake with a gasp, heart pounding. He's been asleep, dead asleep, for far too long. The line is more empty forest than it is manned, and the Germans could be anywhere. Worse yet, there's a fire going again, and he's out of bed, throwing back the covers and stumbling toward it in the dark before they lose another man they way they lost Harry, Toye and Guarnere, Muck and Penkala and Dukeman and — he runs hard into the foot of the bed and finally wakes with a jolt. The world around him shifts and resets, and he registers the thick rug under his bare feet, the distant rumble of the train that must have woken him. 

Nix stirs when Dick's knee and hip collide painfully with the heavy wood of the footboard, shaking the bed. "Stop moving," he grumbles without opening his eyes. "Sleep." 

Dick registers the words only distantly. Sleep is the last thing on his mind. Dick is miles from sleep, miles from the high-stacked mattress and familiar white walls of the room he and Nix have shared for three months now. His pulse is still racing, his hands gone cold and clammy with the memories of how easily a night's silence can be broken by artillery and screaming men. His chest is tight and he knows the war is over, can see his own bedroom and the comforting, hissing glow of the fireplace, but crowding in over top is the spray of ash and blood on white snow, the choked, guttural sobs of men viewing their own bone and muscle laid bare. Sleep is utterly beyond his reach.  

"Dick?" And now Nix is propped up on one elbow, squinting at him in the dim light. Dick realizes the roaring isn't all in his head, that he's heaving in hard, whistling breaths through his nose, his jaw locked and set. He never did break in Bostogne, was too cold, too annoyed, too far back from the line, but he saw the same horrors as every other man who was there and they come back on him now, a year later and an ocean away, with a vengeance. "What're you..." Nix pushes himself heavily toward the foot of the bed, half-sliding, half-crawling, until he can reach out a hand, hot from sleep, to curve around Dick's shoulder. "Hey." 

Dick starts badly at Nix's touch and Nix raises his hands, a surrendering gesture, eyes sharpening in surprise. "Hey," he repeats after a second. 

There are two scenes warring in Dick's mind, both crystal clear. He wishes desperately he could be in his own bedroom, with the glowing coals of the fire hissing faintly and Nix's low voice and warm hands reaching out for him. The streetlight outside their window that has kept him awake previous restless nights now seems almost kind, offering a respite from the dark. But there is also Bastogne, and gunfire, and men with gaping wounds and missing limbs, and Dick knows where he is but he cannot shake the feeling that even now, both places are equally real.

He paces a quick, tight circle, and when his legs collide with the bed again he half-sits, half-falls into Nix's tangle of limbs. Nix catches him and resettles them both, rubbing a tentative hand over his arm. He starts again, twitching away momentarily, but the contact, the tangle of sheets against his legs and Nix's fingers sliding over and slipping under the flannel sleeve of his shirt, finally exert reality's dominance over his memories. This time, when he focuses on the room in front of him, it stays in focus. "You awake?" Nix's voice is a little wary, but its familiar rumble, still rough with sleep, is comforting all the same. Dick still feels every muscle he has strained and ready to snap, but the snow covered forest begins to recede in his mind. 

"Yes," Dick grits out, dropping his face into his hands. He forces himself to take a deep breath, unclenching his jaw and sucking in a long, shuddering gasp of air before blowing it out again. It was a memory, a nightmare, but nothing more. 

That doesn't stop his body from shaking as his muscles slowly unclench, iron-tight tension alternating with wracking, whole-body shivers that he finds, to his disgust, he has no control over. Nix eases in closer behind him, wraps his arms around Dick's stomach, his chest broad and warm against Dick's back, and drops his chin over Dick's shoulder. It's awkward, because Dick refuses to lift his face from his hands, too angry at himself and embarrassed to look even Nix in the eye. 

Once, back at Toccoa, he'd fallen from one of the climbing walls in front of the whole company — to great, if stifled, amusement. The winded feeling is the same, the sense that no matter how hard he tries, he can't get enough air, has to consciously work just to breathe; but familiar, too, is the acute embarrassment at being laid out flat and helpless over a meaningless action. At Toccoa, when he could breathe again, he'd shrugged it off, accepting that at least it would serve as a bonding experience for the men, and as a lesson for them all, including Dick: being an officer made him neither flawless nor invincible. But there is no one else here now, just Dick himself, and he cannot see the benefit in a flood of panic in the middle of the night, of shying away from sleep like a frightened child, and least of all Nix's witness to it. And yet, Dick sits on the edge of his bed, shaking with aftershocks of his nightmare, and Nix sits close behind. Whenever an especially bad wave hits, Dick's shoulder or knee jerks painfully into Nix, but Nix just smooths his hands over Dick's sides, pressing his lips against Dick's temple, his breath slow enough that he could still be half-asleep. "You're okay," he murmurs a few times. 

"I  _know_ ," Dick rasps, and almost accuses Nix of breathing so slowly just to taunt him, but there's ridiculous and then there's just absurd. And anyway, the shaking is beginning to ease. Nix falls silent but continues his best imitation of a blanket draped over Dick's shoulders and Dick, God help him, leans into it, ashamed but too taken apart to reject the comfort so freely offered. Nix's thumbs move in slow circles over his stomach, and he bleeds heat like a radiator. That, too, is reminiscent of Bastogne, but it brings no terror with it, only the reminder that Nix has been both cornerstone and keystone for Dick long before tonight, and never shied from the role. Dick takes another breath, unsteady but deep, and finally lifts his head. He's still shaking slightly, but it's reduced to the occasional small shiver, and his heartbeat has quieted from a gallop to its usual unremarkable pace. He straightens and shoots Nix a warning look, heading off attempts toward either mockery or coddling, but he should have known better. Nix only leans back, smothering a yawn against the back of his hand. He waits while Dick stares at his hands and considers what to possibly say after his display. He suspects it is too much to ask simply to crawl back under the covers and close their eyes, even if sleep seems like at least a vague possibility again. 

"You're sure you don't want a drink?" Nix offers after a minute has passed. But he settles back against the footboard in a slouch, apparently not considering the possibility that Dick's stance might have changed, despite his words. 

"Yeah," Dick manages. "I'm sure." 

"Water? Warm milk?" 

Dick finds that, as usual, Nix's particular blend of both gentle teasing and concern doesn't rub him wrong after all. He dredges up a wan smile, though he can't yet muster the effort it would take to turn and meet Nix's eye. He trusts Nix will hear it instead. "No thanks." 

Nix falls silent again, and finally Dick pulls his feet back up to the bed, turning to face him. Nix is watching him, dark and worried. 

"I'm fine," Dick tells him, embarrassment rearing again, though less acute this time. He rubs a hand through his hair. "Bad dream." 

"I'll say." Dick looks over sharply at that, but Nix isn't ribbing him. Instead he looks troubled, his eyes tracking a movement Dick isn't aware of until he follows Nix's gaze down to his own hands, twisting and pulling at his pajama pants. Dick forces his hands to lay still. 

"I was there, you know," Nix says. Dick glances up when he doesn't continue and cocks an eyebrow, his patience thin.

Nix studies the faintly flickering shadows on the walls, and Dick watches his mouth work slightly and waits for whatever words Nix has to work so hard for. Nix closes his eyes, a long blink to further steel himself. "It's just me," he says heavily, hesitates, and plunges on, voice rough and quiet. "You don't have to be fine, and you don't have to ask for help. But I wish you'd take it. Over there, Dick..." he falters for a moment, then continues. "I tried like hell to get you home in one piece. Seemed easier with a war on." He shakes his head, exhaling a breath that only sounds like a laugh. "I don't know how to do that here, I don't know if I could have done better back there, but I'll do whatever you tell me." 

Dick studies him for a long moment. He's troubled to find that Nix's helplessness isn't ungrounded. Dick remembers the easy way his eyes used to settle on the line of Nix's shoulders, from Georgia to Austria, the way he sought out Nix's company at the end of long days, the relief when Nix found him first. But Nix is right. There is something about being home, about civilian life, that has made Dick retreat into himself, treating Nix with the same weary, wary distance he finds himself putting before everyone, whenever the memories rise up too strongly. But Nix has seen his heart broken long before this, and Nix has only ever quietly held him together while he took the time he needed. If Dick is going to choke on the war now, long after its ending, he acknowledges that he has previously thrown himself into far more uncertain territory than Nix's capable hands. 

Finally he reaches out, curling his fingers over Nix's ankle. "If I knew what to say," Dick offers quietly, keeping his eyes mostly on Nix's bare toes, "I'd tell you." 

Nix eyes him back and sighs, and tips his head in a single exhausted nod. "Yeah," he mutters, and looks up at Dick from beneath his lashes. "You okay?"

Dick considers. He is calm again. He could even get back to sleep, probably. And probably that's all that Nix expects from his response, but Dick bites the inside of his cheek and thinks about the many ways there are to show courage, the new ways in which it's required by a life where there are no more lines to hold, no more bullets to fire or dodge; only the memories the war left behind. "No," he answers honestly, and meets Nix's eyes. "But I'm here." Nix's face crumples a little, in sympathy, Dick thinks, but he only nods. Dick shuffles back toward the pillows, the blankets all well thrown back already. He tucks his feet under the sheets. "Come here," he suggests, because he's reached his limits for three am, and this is hardly a problem they'll make any more headway on tonight. Nix doesn't hesitate, crawling back up the bed and pulling the covers around them both. 

It won't stop the nightmares forever. But it works for now, and Dick accepts that the next time he startles awake, Nix will be there, and that that is a benefit. Nix pulls him close, Dick's head pillowed on Nix's shoulder, Nix's breath ruffling his hair, and tangles their legs together. They sleep. 


End file.
